25 Historical Photos That Capture Moments Lost In Time

Prior to the internet, our knowledge of history was limited to what books taught us. This may have restricted our understanding of how things played out in reality, compared to the narrative we have been fed over time. 

#1

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Queen Elizabeth has died at age 96. She spent 7 decades on the throne, which was longer than the reigns of her father, uncle, grandfather, and great-grandfather combined. Born on April 21, 1926, Queen Elizabeth was older than sliced bread, penicillin, ballpoint pens, nylon, Velcro, the Slinky, and the FM radio. She reigned for nearly 30% of US history.

#2

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This is Adolfo Kaminsky. After his mother was k**led by Nazis in 1941, he joined the French resistance at age 17. He spend most of World War 2 in an underground laboratory in Paris forging passports. He is estimated to have saved the lives of 14,000 French Jews. “I’ll always remember our biggest request for documents. 300 children in 3 days. It wasn’t possible. I had to stay awake as long as possible. Fight against sleep. The math was simple. In one hour, I made 30 fake documents. If I slept for one hour, 30 people would die. My biggest fear was making a technical mistake, any little detail that might escape me. On every document rests the life or death of a human being. So I worked, worked, worked until I passed out. When I woke up, I kept working. We couldn’t stop.” Kaminsky passed away in January 9th, 2023 at the age of 97.

#3

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French knife grinders were called ventres jaunes (“yellow bellies” in English) because of the yellow dust that would be released from the grinding wheel. This photo from 1902 shows the workers on their stomachs in order to save their backs from being hunched all day. They were also encouraged to bring their dogs to work to keep them company and also act as mini heaters by having them rest on their owners’ legs.

#4

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This is Irena Sendler, a Polish social worker and nurse who smuggled approximately 2,500 Jewish children out of N**i-occupied Warsaw. She entered the ghetto using a special work pass and would smuggle out children in the bottom of her toolbox and also utilize her burlap sack for larger kids. She also used ambulances and sewers to get them out of the ghetto. She was eventually caught by the Nazis and despite being tortured and having both her arms and legs broken, she did not reveal the names nor whereabouts of the children she had rescued. She was sentenced to death but managed to escape on the day of her scheduled e*******n after the Polish resistance bribed N**i officials for her release. She is quoted as saying, “Let me stress most emphatically that we who were rescuing children are not some kind of heroes. Indeed, that term irritates me greatly. The opposite is true. I continue to have pangs of conscience that I did so little.” All the children Sendler had rescued had only known her by her code name, Jolanta. Many years after the war, a photo of Sendler appeared in a local newspaper. “A man, a painter, telephoned me,” recalled Sendler, “‘I remember your face,’ he said. `It was you who took me out of the ghetto.’ I had many calls like that!” Sendler lived to the age of 98, passing away on May 12, 2008.

#5

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This is Gerda Weissmann Klein. She spent three years in several different N**i concentration camps. In late January of 1945, Gerda and 4,000 other Jewish women were forced to embark on a 350-mile death march to flee the advances of the Allied forces. By early May, Gerda was one of only 120 women who were still alive. The rest—including several of her childhood friends—had died from exhaustion, starvation, random executions, and exposure to the elements. Gerda was one day shy of her 21st birthday when she was rescued by American soldiers. Weighing only 68 lbs. (30.84 kg), Gerda’s hair was nearly white and her clothes were tattered and crawling with lice. She hadn’t taken a bath in three years. She later recalled seeing the man who saved her life: “I stood in the doorway of that factory, and I knew that I was free. I saw a strange car coming down the hill, with the white star of the American army on its hood. Two men in strange uniforms sat in it, we gathered them to be Americans. One of the men came towards me, and I looked at him with incredible awe and disbelief that I was looking at someone who fought for us. Of course I was terribly frightened. I looked at him and said, ‘we are Jewish.’ There was a long paused, then he said, ‘so am I.’ It was the greatest moment of my life. He asked me to come with him, and he held the door open for me. He has now been holding the door open for 50 years as my husband.” Gerda married Kurt Klein (swipe left) in Paris and moved to Buffalo, New York where they eventually had three children and eight grandchildren. Gerda became a human rights activist and published her own autobiography titled, “All But My Life.” She is still alive today at age 97.

#6

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In 1996, Binti Jua, an 8-year-old female Western lowland gorilla, tended to a 3-year-old boy who had fallen into her enclosure at the Brookfield Zoo in Illinois. The child had climbed the wall and fallen 24 feet (7.3m), breaking his hand and receiving a large gash on his face. Binti walked over and cradled the boy in her arms. She carried him over to the service entrance and handed him over to her zookeepers. Her 17-month old baby, Koola clutched her back throughout the whole ordeal. For many months after the incident, Binti received special treats and food from her caretakers and drew in huge crowds. She is still alive today at 34 years old and has had three granddaughters and one great-grandson.

#7

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This is the grave of Leonard Matlovich. After serving three tours in Vietnam, Matlovich became a recipient of the Bronze Star and Purple Heart. On March 6, 1975, after 12 years of service, Matlovich handed a letter to his commanding officer, declaring his homosexuality. Despite his accolades and exemplary military performance, Matlovich was deemed unfit for service and was promptly discharged. He sued for reinstatement and instantly became the most famous gay activist during a time when the LGBT movement was still struggling to establish legitimacy in the United States. Below is an excerpt from Matlovich’s interview with Studs Terkel, just a few months after the discharge. “My philosophy now is that everyone in the world should be allowed to do what they want, when they want, where they want to do it, as long as what they’re doing does not violate the rights of another human being.” “What two consenting adults do in their bedroom is their business and no one else’s. And for someone to put them down or… Just that two men can touch and love and have feelings of to want and be wanted and to need and be needed and to desire and be desired and just to love and be loved, I think is very, very beautiful. And that parents growing up today will give our little children guns, and we are very proud of them when they play Cowboys and Indians and run around. But when they show emotions and, and love, and two little boys touch, people get uptight, and they’re so afraid that their child may, may love. It’s very sad.”

#8

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Ronald (left) and Carl McNair (right) were born 10 months apart in the Segregated South. The two were inseparable as toddlers and well into adulthood. In 1959, 9-year-old Ronald McNair went to a public library in Lake City, South Carolina because he was looking for more advanced books on science.⁣ ⁣ Carl accompanied his younger brother and described what happened next:⁣ ⁣ “So, as he was walking in there, all these folks were staring at him — because they were white folk only — and they were looking at him and saying, you know, ‘Who is this Negro? So, he politely positioned himself in line to check out his books. Well, this old librarian, she says, ‘This library is not for coloreds.’ He said, ‘Well, I would like to check out these books.’ She says, ‘Young man, if you don’t leave this library right now, I’m gonna call the police.’ So he just propped himself up on the counter, and sat there, and said, ‘I’ll wait.'”⁣ The police and their mother were called to the library. Despite the librarian’s protest, the police officer allowed Ronald to borrow the books. Ronald went on to get a PhD in Physics from MIT in 1976 and then soon after, applied to join NASA. Carl supported his brother all the way, often in disbelief: “So how was a colored boy from South Carolina—wearing glasses, never flew a plane—how was he gonna become an astronaut?” Carl went on to say that “Ron was one who didn’t accept societal norms as being his norm… That was for other people… he got to be aboard his own Starship Enterprise.” Ronald became the second Black astronaut when he flew as a mission specialist from February 3rd to 11th, 1984. Ronald was then chosen to be one of the 7 astronauts onboard the space shuttle Challenger. He died along with six other crew members on January 28, 1986, at the age of 35. ⁣ Today, the library that refused to lend him books is now named after him.

#9

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A Lego letter to parents from 1974.⁣ ⁣ Here’s the letter transcribed: ⁣ ⁣ “To Parents⁣ ⁣ The urge to create is equally strong in all children. Boys and girls.⁣ ⁣ It’s the imagination that counts. Not skill. You build whatever comes into your head, the way you want it. A bed or a truck.⁣ ⁣ A dolls house or a spaceship.⁣ A lot of boys like dolls houses.⁣ ⁣ They’re more human than spaceships. A lot of girls prefer spaceships. They’re more exciting than dolls houses.⁣ The most important thing is to put the right material in their hands and let them create whatever appeals to them.”⁣

#10

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Frank Sinatra was a fervent anti-racist and an early activist during the civil rights movement.⁣ ⁣ He refused to stay at hotels and play at clubs that did not admit black people. His band would also provide equal pay and treatment for black musicians. It was through his relentless and tireless efforts that Las Vegas quickly became integrated.⁣ ⁣ In an interview in 2016, Frank Sinatra, Jr. had this to say about his father:⁣ ⁣ “In the days when Las Vegas began to become popular, the black performers could play in showrooms, but they couldn’t stay in the hotel. And it was Frank Sinatra who went to the board of directors, who had rather shady pasts, and he said, ‘Are you guys going to come into the twentieth century, or aren’t you?’…Somebody said ‘Well, we have white people, we have black people.” Sinatra, the story goes, said to them, ‘The money is green. How about that?’ And they began to look at each other and the wheels were turning, and because of Sammy (Davis), Las Vegas became integrated.”⁣ ⁣ Sinatra was also big-time supporter of Martin Luther King and helped him raise money to support the Civil Rights Movement by headlining fundraisers. In 1958, he wrote in Ebony Magazine:⁣ “A friend to me has no race, no class and belongs to no minority. My friendships are formed out of affection, mutual respect and a feeling of having something in common. These are eternal values that cannot be classified.”⁣

#11

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This is Dr. Eugene Lazowski, a Polish doctor who saved 8,000 Jewish people by creating a fake typhus epidemic in Stalowa Wola, a city in Poland that was occupied by the Nazis during World War 2. ⁣ Here is an excerpt from the Chicago Sun-Times in 2006 about how Lazowski risked the N**i death penalty in order to carry out the Hippocratic Oath:⁣ ⁣ “When the Nazis overran Poland in World War II, Lazowski yearned to find a way to fight back, to protect human life, and he seized upon a paradoxical instrument of salvation—the German army’s profound fear of disease. While German industrialist Oskar Schindler, whose heroic story was told in the movie ‘Schindler’s List,’ employed bribes and influence to protect as many as 1,000 Jews who worked in his factory, Lazowski slyly used medical science to save the lives of thousands of Jews and other Poles in 12 Polish villages. He and a fellow physician, Stanislaw Matulewicz, faked a typhus epidemic that forced the German army to quarantine the villages.⁣” Matulewicz discovered a bacteria strain that when injected into a person would cause them to test positive for typhus without suffering from the ill effects of the disease. Lazowski began to inject this bacteria strain into non-Jews because he knew that the Nazis would immediately k**l Jewish people infected with typhus. He then sent the blood samples to German labs. Once typhus was detected, the Nazis proceeded to quarantine the outbreak area. Lazowski kept track of how many “typhus” cases he was sending to the labs to make sure they actually correlated with how the disease typically progresses. The quarantine spared the lives of approximately 8,000 men, women and children from being deported to concentration camps. Lazowski kept his activities a secret, not even telling his wife. After the war, he moved to Chicago where he had to undergo more training to receive his medical license in the US. In 1981, he began working as a professor at the University of Illinois, eventually obtaining emeritus status. He passed away in 2006 at the age of 93.

#12

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A photo from the Bush to Obama transition, 2009.⁣ ⁣ Here’s an excerpt from a letter written by Barbara and Jenna Bush to Sasha and Malia.⁣ ⁣ “…Sasha and Malia, here is some advice to you from two sisters who have stood where you will stand and who have lived where you will live:⁣ ⁣ —Surround yourself with loyal friends. They’ll protect and calm you and join in on some of the fun, and appreciate the history.⁣ ⁣ —If you’re traveling with your parents over Halloween, don’t let it stop you from doing what you would normally do. Dress up in some imaginative, elaborate costume (if you are like us a pack of Juicy Fruit and a Vampiress) and trick-or-treat down the plane aisle.⁣ ⁣ —If you ever need a hug, go find Ramsey. If you want to talk football, look for Buddy. And, if you just need a smile, look for ‘Smiley.’⁣ ⁣ —And, a note on White House puppies—our sweet puppy Spot was nursed on the lawn of the White House. And then of course, there’s Barney, who most recently bit a reporter. Cherish your animals because sometimes you’ll need the quiet comfort that only animals can provide.⁣ ⁣ —Slide down the banister of the solarium, go to T-ball games, have swimming parties, and play Sardines on the White House lawn. Have fun and enjoy your childhood in such a magical place to live and play.⁣ ⁣ —When your dad throws out the first pitch for the Yankees, go to the game.⁣ ⁣ —In fact, go to anything and everything you possibly can: the Kennedy Center for theater, State Dinners, Christmas parties (the White House staff party is our favorite!), museum openings, arrival ceremonies, and walks around the monuments. Just go. Four years goes by so fast, so absorb it all, enjoy it all!⁣ ⁣ …Many people will think they know him, but they have no idea how he felt the day you were born, the pride he felt on your first day of school, or how much you both love being his daughters. So here is our most important piece of advice: remember who your dad really is.”⁣ ⁣

#13

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100 years ago—on May 31 and June 1, 1921—the Tulsa m******e occurred on “Black Wall Street,” the wealthiest Black community in the United States at the time.⁣⁣ ⁣⁣ Black businesses that flourished on Greenwood Avenue were attacked and destroyed by an angry mob. 35 city blocks were destroyed, 1,200 homes burned to the ground, an estimated 75 to 300 people were killed, and over 800 people were injured. ⁣⁣ Eyewitnesses said they even saw a dozen or more private planes in the sky dropping burning balls of turpentine onto the buildings. It has been called “the single worst incident of racial violence in American history.”⁣⁣ ⁣⁣ And yet the Tulsa m******e was not mentioned in any of the history books I read growing up and I would have never known about it had I not had this one history teacher…⁣⁣ ⁣⁣ He gave the whole class an assignment to build a replica of Greenwood Avenue using paper, cardboard, index cards, paint and popsicle sticks. It took us almost a month to complete it…⁣⁣ ⁣⁣ For the final part of the lesson, we took the replica and carefully carried it outside to the courtyard near the handball courts. Our teacher made us sit in a circle around the replica and let us take in what we had achieved.⁣⁣ ⁣⁣ He then lit a match and proceeded to burn it down as we all sat there watching in horror.⁣⁣ ⁣⁣ You can call it irresponsible, distasteful or cheap shock value—and this lesson will more than likely not fly in today’s classroom—but this was Brooklyn during the late 90s. There were no such things as trigger warnings. 20 years later, I still vividly remember it and I have never forgotten.⁣ ⁣ Source: The Burning: M******e, Destruction, and the Tulsa Race Riot of 1921 (2003) by Tim Madigan

#14

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This is a photo of John Lewis being arrested in Tennessee for organizing and demonstrating during the Civil Rights movement, 1961. ⁣ ⁣ In the same year, at age 21, Lewis was attacked by two men in Rock Hill, South Carolina for attempting to enter a waiting room designated for “whites only”. He suffered injuries to his face and ribs. ⁣ ⁣ Two weeks later, Lewis was arrested in Jackson, Mississippi where he was imprisoned at the State Penitentiary for nearly 40 days. His crime? He refused to leave the “whites only” area at a local bus station. ⁣ ⁣ Upon his release, Lewis and 12 other freedom riders went to Birmingham, Alabama where they were beaten by a mob made up of KKK members who were weilding baseball bats, metal pipes, chains and rocks. The group managed to escape to Montgomery where Lewis was hit in the head with a wooden crate. “It was very violent. I thought I was going to die. I was left lying at the Greyhound bus station in Montgomery unconscious,” recalled Lewis. ⁣ ⁣ In 1965, Lewis was again leading a protest for Civil Rights, marching with some 600 people from Selma, Alabama to Montgomery. As they were leaving Selma, state troopers descended upon the protestors with clubs, bullwhips and tear gas. Lewis suffered a skull fracture on that day known as “Bloody Sunday.” ⁣ ⁣ Fast forward to 2009—Lewis watched as Barack Obama was sworn in as the 44th President of the United States. When the inauguration came to an end, Lewis approached the first Black president with a piece of paper and asked if he could sign it. ⁣ ⁣ He wrote: ⁣ ⁣ “Because of you, John.⁣ Barack Obama.”

#15

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This is 23-year-old Bobbi Gibb in 1966, right after becoming the first woman to run the Boston marathon.⁣ ⁣ A few months earlier, Gibb had received a letter in the mail, disqualifying her for the marathon. The letter stated that women are “not physiologically able to run a marathon.” The Amateur Athletics Union even went as far as prohibiting women from running more than 1.5 miles (2.4 km) and the organizers of the Boston Marathon did not want to “take the liability” of having a woman compete.⁣ ⁣ However, the rejection letter only emboldened her. On the day of the race, Gibb showed up wearing a blue hooded sweatshirt over a black swim-suit and her brother’s Bermuda shorts. She hid behind a bush near the starting line and waited. When the starting gun fired, Gibb waited some more until about half the runners had passed. She then jumped in and blended into the pack.⁣ ⁣ However, it wasn’t long before the men saw that she was a woman. To her surprise, she was not met with hostility, but with encouragement and support. She removed her sweatshirt and and finished the race in 3 hours and 21 minutes and 40 seconds, beating two-thirds of the runners.⁣ ⁣ Diana Chapman Walsh, who later went on to become the President of Wellesley College, recalled that day many years later: “That was my senior year at Wellesley. As I had done every spring since I arrived on campus, I went out to cheer the runners. But there was something different about that Marathon Day—like a spark down a wire, the word spread to all of us lining the route that a woman was running the course. For a while, the ‘screech tunnel’ fell silent. We scanned face after face in breathless anticipation until just ahead of her, through the excited crowd, a ripple of recognition shot though the lines and we cheered as we never had before. We let out a roar that day, sensing that this woman had done more than just break the gender barrier in a famous race…”

#16

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This is a portrait of Spanish spy and double agent, Juan Pujol Garcia in his uniform as a lieutenant in the Spanish Republic Army.⁣ ⁣ Up until the breakout of World War II, Pujol was pretty much a failure in all aspects of his life. He had failed at being a student, soldier, businessman, and cinema magnate. Not to mention, his marriage was falling apart.⁣ ⁣ When the war broke out, Pujol approached the British three different times to work for them. When they turned him away, he approached the Nazis, and they accepted him (giving him the codename Arabel). Once he earned credentials working as a N**i spy, he approached the Allies again, this time getting a job as a double agent (codenamed Garbo).⁣ ⁣ He began to feed the Nazis a combination of misinformation that was true but useless. Any high-value information always got to the Nazis just a little too late. He even started a spy network consisting of 27 sub-agents. However, in reality, none of them existed. They were completely made up. Nevertheless, he submitted expense reports for them and the Nazis paid their salaries.⁣ ⁣ At one point, Pujol had to explain why some high-value information got to the Nazis late. He told them that one of his spies had died and even managed to get the Nazis to pay pension to the imaginary spy’s imaginary wife for her loss. Not only did his false information get the Nazis to waste millions of dollars, but he was also instrumental in convincing the Nazis that the attacks on D-Day were just a diversion, and the real attack was yet to come, keeping vital resources away from the front lines.⁣ ⁣ Pujol is one of the only people to ever get an Iron Cross from the Nazis (which required Hitler’s personal authorization, since he wasn’t a soldier) and an MBE (Member of the Order of the British Empire) from King George VI⁣ ⁣ After the war, Pujol feared that he would be hunted by surviving Nazis. In 1949, with the help of MI5, Pujol travelled to Angola where he faked his own death from malaria. He then moved to Lagunillas, Venezuela, where he set up a small bookstore and gift shop, living in anonymity until his death in 1988.

#17

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Lepa Radić (1925 – 1943) was a Bosnian Serb who was executed at the age of 17 for shooting at Nazis during World War 2. In her last moments, they offered to spare her life in return for the names of her accomplices, but she refused by saying, “I am not a traitor of my people. Those whom you are asking about will reveal themselves when they have succeeded in wiping out all you evildoers, to the last man.”

#18

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Behind the scenes from the British television show, Telletubbies, which originally aired from 1997 to 2001. In real life, the Telletubbies were actually very tall. The oldest, purple Teletubby, Tinky Winky, stood at 10 feet tall (305 cm). The red Teletubby, Po, was 6 feet 6 (198 cm) inches tall. The yellow Teletubby, Laa-Laa, was 6 feet 5 inches (196 cm). The green Teletubby, Dipsy, was 8 feet (244 cm).⁣ The show was filmed on an incredibly large set to create the illusion that the Telletubbies were small. The location of the set was so secret that visitors had to be blindfolded. Eventually, word got out and it became known that a sloping hill on a private field in Wimpstone, Warwickshire in England was the home to “Tubbytronic Superdome”. After the show ended, tourists began to flock to the iconic set.⁣ The landowners became fed up with trespassers, stating that “it was never meant to be a tourist attraction. We had people jumping fences, crossing cattle fields and all sorts…” They ultimately decided to flood the entire set and it has now been underwater for nearly two decades. The set is now occupied by a family of swans and freshwater fish.

#19

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Photographer Cecil J. Williams drinking from a white only water fountain, 1964. Williams was born in 1937 to parents of mixed ancestry: his mother was half-white and his father was half Native American. At the age of 9, Williams received a camera from his older brother and soon realized he could make money off his photographs. He photographed his first wedding at age 11 and by 12 he was taking photos of people on Sundays at church, charging them a dollar or two. By the 1950s, he turned his camera to documenting desegregation efforts in South Carolina. Some of his photos depict activities during the Briggs v. Elliott case, which was the first of five desegregation cases pushing to integrate public schools in the United States. In January of 1960, when Williams was a senior in college, he visited NYC and read that JFK was coming to a downtown hotel for a press conference. Williams wanted to snap some photos but forgot his press pass and was about to be kicked out by security when JFK stepped in and told them to let Williams stay. JFK gave Williams his personal address and soon he became one of JFK’s favorite photographers during his campaign to become president. Williams is still alive at 81 years old and is currently spending his 2019 summer opening up his own museum, which will showcase more than 350 images and artifacts from the civil rights movement.

#20

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Frida Kahlo takes a family photo, wearing a 3-piece suit and holding a cane, 1924.⁣ ⁣ Nearly 30 years later, in 1953, she writes a letter to Diego Rivera as she awaits surgery to amputate one of her legs.⁣ ⁣ “I’m writing this letter from a hospital room before I am admitted into the operating theatre. They want me to hurry, but I am determined to finish writing first, as I don’t want to leave anything unfinished. Especially now that I know what they are up to. They want to hurt my pride by cutting a leg off. When they told me it would be necessary to amputate, the news didn’t affect me the way everybody expected. No, I was already a maimed woman when I lost you, again, for the umpteenth time maybe, and still I survived.⁣ ⁣ I am not afraid of pain and you know it. It is almost inherent to my being, although I confess that I suffered, and a great deal, when you cheated on me, every time you did it, not just with my sister but with so many other women. How did they let themselves be fooled by you?”⁣ ⁣ “…Let’s not fool ourselves, Diego, I gave you everything that is humanly possible to offer and we both know that. But still, how the hell do you manage to seduce so many women when you’re such an ugly son of a b***h?” ⁣ The reason why I’m writing is not to accuse you of anything more than we’ve already accused each other of in this and however many more bloody lives. It’s because I’m having a leg cut off (damned thing, it got what it wanted in the end). I told you I’ve counted myself as incomplete for a long time, but why the f**k does everybody else need to know about it too? Now my fragmentation will be obvious for everyone to see, for you to see… That’s why I’m telling you before you hear it on the grapevine…”⁣ ⁣ “…I’m writing to let you know I’m releasing you, I’m amputating you. Be happy and never seek me again. I don’t want to hear from you, I don’t want you to hear from me. If there is anything I’d enjoy before I die, it’d be not having to see your f*****g horrible b*****d face wandering around my garden.⁣ ⁣ That is all, I can now go to be chopped up in peace.⁣ ⁣ Good bye from somebody who is crazy and vehemently in love with you,⁣ ⁣ Your Frida”

#21

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In 1973, Sacheen Littlefeather took the stage to reject an Oscar on behalf of Marlon Brando. She was given 60 seconds on stage to provide the following speech: “Hello. My name is Sacheen Littlefeather. I’m Apache and I am president of the National Native American Affirmative Image Committee. I’m representing Marlon Brando this evening and he has asked me to tell you in a very long speech, which I cannot share with you presently because of time but I will be glad to share with the press afterwards, that he very regretfully cannot accept this very generous award. And the reasons for this being are the treatment of American Indians today by the film industry – excuse me – and on television in movie reruns, and also with recent happenings at Wounded Knee. I beg at this time that I have not intruded upon this evening and that we will in the future, our hearts and our understandings will meet with love and generosity. Thank you on behalf of Marlon Brando.” She kept her full composure despite the boos and jeers coming from the audience. John Wayne had to be restrained by security because he wanted to physically a*****t her as she left the stage. Clint Eastwood mocked her by saying that he was presenting the award on behalf of “all the cowboys shot in all the John Ford Westerns.” Subsequently, Littlefeather was blacklisted by Hollywood and never worked in the film industry again. Nearly half a century later, Littlefeather will return to the Academy as a guest of honor on September 17, 2022.

#22

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A member of the Harlem Hellfighters (369th Infantry Regiment) poses for the camera while holding a puppy he saved during World War 1, 1918. The Harlem Hellfighters was a regiment made up of decorated Black soldiers who fought as part of the French army because the U.S. did not allow Black soldiers to fight alongside white soldiers. The French accepted the Harlem Hellfighters with open arms and did not racially segregate them. During World War 1, they fought on the front lines for 191 days, longer than any other American unit. And as a result, suffered the most casualties of any American regiment—losing approximately 1,500 men. Despite the heavy death toll and the poor replacement system, the Harlem Hellfighters never lost a trench or a foot of ground to the enemy; none of them became prisoners of war. Not only were they one of the most successful regiments of World War 1, but they also helped bring Jazz to France. Upon returning home, the Harlem Hellfighters received a welcome parade in New York City; a privilege that was denied to them before they had left for war. However, the celebrations were short lived as the summer of 1919 became known as the Red Summer, in which the country saw some of the worst racial violence since the Civil War. The Harlem Hellfighters who dreamed of returning home to a place that would finally treat them with respect and as equal human beings, quickly realized that nothing had changed at all.

#23

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This is the right forearm of Michelangelo’s Moses (c. 1513–1515) statue. The arrow points to a small muscle called the extensor digiti minimi, which only contracts when the pinky is lifted, otherwise it is invisible. Most of Michelangelo’s sculptures are painstakingly detailed and you can clearly see his obsession with the human body, which he saw as a physical representation of the soul. Michelangelo always preferred sculpting over painting. Here’s a letter he wrote to Giovanni da Pistoia (a member of the Florentine Academy) while painting the Sistine Chapel. “I’ve already grown a goiter from this t*****e, swollen up here like a cat from Lombardy (or anywhere where the stagnant water’s p****n). My stomach’s squashed under my chin, my beard’s pointing at heaven, my brain’s crushed in a casket, my breast twists like a harpy’s. My brush, above me all the time, dribbles the paint so my face makes a fine floor for droppings! My haunches are grinding into my guts, my poor a*s strains to work as a counterweight, every gesture I make is blind and aimless. My skin hangs loose below me, my spine’s all knotted from folding over itself, I’m bent taut as a Syrian bow. And because I’m like this, my thoughts are crazy perfidious tripe: anyone shoots badly through a crooked blowpipe. My painting is dead. Defend it for me, Giovanni, protect my honor. I am not in the right place—I am not a painter.”

#24

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The Huichol are Indigenous people that originated from the deep mountains of Central Mexico some 15,000 years ago. Today, they live in the Sierra Madre Occidental mountains and work as subsistence farmers, growing maize, beans, squash, and cucumbers. According to their ancient traditions, both men and women experience the pain of childbirth together. The father would position himself on the rafters with rope tied around his scrotum, which would be pulled by the mother during delivery. Today, we know very little of the medical knowledge and birth customs of the Indigenous people of the Americas because much of their hand-painted manuscripts were destroyed by Spanish conquistadors and missionaries who viewed them as “pagan” practices.

#25

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A dancer bends over in front of the judge to show that her underwear was too large to expose anything anatomical. In 1983, three exotic dancers were arrested by undercover officers for violating Pinellas County’s anti-nudity ordinance. The dancers argued that their shorts were too big to show anything. The judge ended up agreeing with the dancers and the case was dismissed.